HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Happy New Year, everyone! I can't believe how quickly last year went. It certainly was a busy one, especially with the birth of The Kinky Apothecary in April. The speed with which it went from an idea to reality is actually still pretty overwhelming, but we've pretty much conquered all the teething problems, and hopefully everything will run a lot more smoothly this year. We've also got a lot of exciting new developments planned, so keep watching this space.

One thing is that I am planning to actually use this blog and post more often! I've even made it one of my new year's resolutions. I had hoped to start off on the right foot by posting something on 1/1/11, but of course old habits die hard. Well, at least I've still managed to get one in before the end of the first week of the year. Baby steps...

Inspired by this naturallycurly.com article, I thought it would be a good idea to come up with a few with a few "New Hair" resolutions. Here are a few to start you off (really just reiterating what I've said in the past):

1/ Deep condition weekly with heat. You'll see a huge difference in no time
2/ Stop combing dry hair!!!
3/ Healthy lifestyle = healthy hair, so start eating right, drinking more water and exercising!
4/ I know a lot of people are still quite reliant on the hairdresser. Stop, and start learning how to do your hair yourself
5/ Seal your ends!!!

Mine is to learn how to actually style my hair. My current inability to perfect an updo is just lame. I'll let you know how I get on!

Catch you soon, people!

Kinky Apothecary @ Bogobiri's Sunday Souk

Calling all Kinky fans in Lagos this Sunday! Pop over to the Sunday Souk at Bogobiri, SW Ikoyi from 12-6pm, where will be selling all your favourite hair products! Of course I will be on hand to answer any questions you may have, and the first 20 sales get a free gift!



Look forward to seeing you there!

Kinkspiration! - Esperanza Spalding

With two Kinky posts in a week, we’re really spoiling you! But it’s a slow day, we haven’t had Kinkspiration in a while, and we’ve got that Friday feeling, so what the heck!

This time its Jazz bassist and singer, Esperanza Spalding. I’ll let the pictures do most of the talking, but seriously, WOW!







And not only does she have amazing hair, she’s also super talented, teaching herself to play the violin at the age of 5!

Here's her cover of my favourite Stevie Wonder song ‘Overjoyed’ to get us in the mood for Lagos Jazz Series this weekend.



Have a Kinktastic one, peeps!

Moisturising and sealing

Anyone who had seen me around over the last five or six months might have heard me complain about how I desperately needed a trim. I’ve finally had one (more a cut than a trim, but that’s a topic for a whole new post) but in those months before I was able to find someone I trusted enough to wield a pair of shears near my head, I found that in addition to keeping my hair moisturised for longer, sealing my ends helped make them smoother, less prone to knots and splits, and generally appear much more polished.

So what does sealing your hair entail? I have mentioned before the difference between moisturisers and oils. You can only moisturise your hair with water, products with water as their first ingredient, or products containing humectants such as aloe vera, glycerin and honey, as these draw the water our of the air and into your hair (provided the environment you're in is humid enough).

Oils do not provide moisture, but merely seal it in, if it is already there (as well as nourishing your hair in other ways- but more on that in another post).

So to seal your hair, all you have to do is apply a butter, oil or oil based product over wet hair or after moisturising, to lock in that moisture. Don't forget to check the ingredients to make sure you are using pure butters and oils. Depending on personal preference or the state of your hair, these can be applied to the entire hair shaft, or just concentrated on the ends. I normally just apply my oil to the end of my twists as I'm going along. My personal favourite is Castor Oil as I find this works better for me than any other oil or butter whatever the weather. However different things work for different people, so its a matter of experimenting and finding out what your hair likes best. Just remember not to be too heavy-handed otherwise you'll end up leaving Soul Glo patches wherever you go... and I learned this the hard way!

I know everyone loves pictures, so I tried to take some of my hair to compare when I had not sealed in a while, to when I started sealing again- hence the delay in this post as I needed to wait to take the 'after' pics.

You will notice that my hair photography skills have not improved an iota, but I'm sure you'll get the idea.

Here are my ends when I stopped sealing for a month:





And here they are 3 weeks after I started again. This was before I had my hair cut, and although I obviously cannot guarantee that I photographed the exact same hairs as before, it was in the same general area:







(Please excuse that disgraceful chipped nail varnish)

Now again, not everything works the same way for everybody. Some people claim they can get away without sealing, and their hair behaves just fine. However if you are having issues retaining moisture, or your ends are easily knotted or frayed, you are most probably missing out an important step by not sealing (NB: There are other possible factors for these problems which we will cover later, but sealing is a good first step to try before resorting to more drastic measures).

And we all know that protecting your ends is key to length retention, so for those who haven't yet caught on to the practise of sealing: try it... you might like it!

I love my hair!

Hey all!

Sincere apologies, AGAIN, for the silence over the past couple of weeks. There have been some very exciting developments here at Kinky Towers that have kept us extremely busy. Keen to find out what they are? Watch this space.

In the meantime, we have a great line-up of posts answering the most frequently asked questions. Here's a list of the next 5 topics, just so you know I'm not bluffing:

1/ Moisturising and sealing (yes, we'll finally get round to posting that one!)
2/ Swimming routine
3/ Working out with natural hair
4/ Braid maintenance
5/ Stuck on the stylist - for those who can't get their head around doing their hair themselves, these are things to insist on next time you're in the chair.

Feel free to leave a comment, drop us an email at kinky.apothecary@gmail.com, or write on the wall of the Facebook page if there are any topics you'd like me to cover, and I'll see what I can do.

We'll kick things off with this message of natural hair love and acceptance... from Sesame Street! I know this video has been doing the rounds on the hair blogs recently, but it is definitely worth reposting.



Enjoy!